[I]n the days since he was nominated he realized that to be "part of a team but not 100 percent with the team" was an untenable position.

In his written statement, Gregg cited recent developments regarding the economic stimulus package and the decision to have the next census director report directly to senior White House officials as evidence that he and President Obama were too different ideologically for the pairing to work. "This was simply a bridge too far for me," Gregg said of his decision....

"This is not a time for partisanship. This is not a time when we should stand in our ideological corners and shout at each other," Gregg said on Feb. 3. "This is a time to govern and govern well. And therefore, when the President asked me to join his administration and participate in trying to address the issues of this time, I believed it was my obligation to say yes, and I look forward to it with enthusiasm."

So who decided to go partisan: Obama or Gregg or both? Doesn't the stimulus package have to be seen as partisan at this point? The Republicans must define themselves in contrast to it, and the Democrats need to defend it boldly as their own work. We have a 2-party system. That's a good thing.

I assume it was the decision to put the census under the control of Obama's top political advisor rather than the Commerce Dept that triggered this.

It's one of the most important functions of the Commerce Department. It may in fact be unconstitutional to do what Obama is doing with it. Gregg could hardly help but fight it, possibly in court. A huge mess for any cabinet member. Seeing that looming in the near future would put just about anyone off a job, I think.

I'm more cynical than EnigmatiCore. I think the nomination was a cheap play to get another Democrat in the Senate, and when the Governor indicated that he would honor Gregg's wishes in appointing a Repulican, the administration lost interest, withdrew all the carrots it had offered Gregg, and the now-disgraced Gregg pulled out.

In the previous thread I said: "I think he's looking at a tough re-election bid in 2010 and wants to ensure he's around in one capacity or another after the election."

I still believe that's the case. However, I think that he found himself in a position of having to compromise his principles more than he expected. I suspect that he eventually saw himself as a political pawn designed to give Obama the appearance of nonpartisanship but without giving Gregg the autonomy or influence required for it to truly be nonpartisan. The Census power grab was probably just one piece of evidence of that fact, the stimulus bill another.

We're receiving E-mails from Capitol Hill staffers expressing frustration that they can't get a copy of the stimulus bill agreed to last night at a price of $789 billion. What's more, staffers are complaining about who does have a copy: K Street lobbyists. E-mails one key Democratic staffer: "K Street has the bill, or chunks of it, already, and the congressional offices don't.

Christy said... "Any chance, she asked eagerly, that the census bureau shenanigans are an impeachable offence?"

Gerald Ford put it best: "What ... is an impeachable offense? The only honest answer is that an ompeachable offense is whatever a majority of he House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history." 116 Cong. Rec. H3113-4 (1970) (proposing the impeachment of Justice Douglas). What, though, does it matter if Obama has commited an undeniably impeachable offense? This House could be handed the smoking gun and still refuse to impeach.

I don't care if y'all want to get worked up about the census. Let me retract any suggestion that y'all may not need to be frothing. Froth away.

The census provides raw data for redistricting. We could have neccessary redistricting to avoid malapportionment, partisan redistricting, or, even worse, California-style redistricting that favors incumbents of both parties.

Since the 2 amendment has let American cititzens stay armed and dangerous, the only attack that The Revolution can use here is to steal their elections. That makes ACORN the vanguard of the proletariat. To tactically win while Comrade Obama is still capable of mesmerizing the Propaganda Outlets, there needs to be the immediate creation of new votes under ACORN's control. this will be done by computer models creating census totals where we want them. The stimulus was carefully designed to buy all the illegal votes that ACORN can shove into the vote count. Once elected,and with the the Supreme court packed with ideological fellow travelors,the Party's rule will be unchallenged, unless the News Media betrays the Revolution by opposition Propaganda efforts.The Fairness Doctrine will deal with them and be approved by the packed Courts as instructed.Then all enemies of the People will be arrested and shot on orders of Commissar Ayers starting with Judd Gregg and his family.

"Senator Gregg reached out to the President and offered his name for secretary of commerce," said Gibbs.

"And therefore, when the president asked me to join his administration and participate in trying to address the issues of this time......"

So Gregg says, " I wanna be your secretary of commerce Mr President," and Obama answers, "Hummm, ok, let me think about it." The next day Obama calls Gregg and says, "Senator Gregg, will you join my administration as secretary of commerce?"

That just doesn't sound right, am I missing something here? Is one of those guys lying or is that the way it works in Washington? Do a lot of people just offer their name up for cabinet positions and the president chooses one? What?

This can be translated very very easily. Gregg shoots himself in the foot because he got swept up in the new age of Mr. Barely's bullshit, got offered a cabinet post to a department that is about almost as useless as it's function, got a shitload of ball busting from republicans and conservatives for vacating a Senate seat that will allow a Democrat governer to nominate either another Democrat or at the very least (for the illusion of bi-partisanship) a liberal Republican senator. And now it looks like things aren't going your way, your President is yanking a vital function from underneath your feet as a head of that Department, you see the writing on the wall and you decide to bail with your tail between your legs and magically come to your senses. Hey man, whatever it takes to keep the lefties away from a filibuster proof majority I say at this point. It's a total and complete power grab and with your looming electoral situation looking like total shit, you took the smart way out. Good luck with that.

That satellite collision was very interesting, and big news in my work. Although the bigger news this week was the launch of NOAA-19. People tell me that this is the satellite that was accidentally dropped (Oops!) but it seems to be sending back good visible data.

Gregg may have been naive enough to think that Obama was genuinely going for bipartisanship with the census and so on. If it was just a ploy to open up another Senate seat--which seems about right now--I can't imagine why he would stay.

I think that the Census is something that requires an *extreme* appearance of impartiality.

As for the Cabinet stuff... I think that Obama pulling in the Census... I think that he's probably entirely trustworthy and is only doing it because it is so very very important. That doesn't negate the appearance element at all, but it might explain some of the other stuff that seems to be going on.

If Gregg is telling it straight, then that fits, too. It fits with the general fiasco with Hillary and the Ambassadorship of Iraq and other primary appointments at State that seem not to have been made by her.

What it fits with is Obama wanting to control anything he feels is a priority.

Which means that the chances of Gregg being micro-managed and not allowed to contribute his own ideas are large.

Unfortunately it also means that we probably ARE looking at the second Carter administration.

I was really surprised by that satellite collision. I thought both DOD and the commercial guys took care not to let that sort of thing happen.

I mean it's one thing to get surprised by say the head of explosive bolt tumbling around in the path of your nice new toy. But an intact Soviet Cosmos, complete with nuke powerplant? Sounds like a big radar satellite to me. I thought we really kept track of where those heavy dead nuke birds were.

Rather a chickenshit move on the part of Gregg, considering he lobbied for the job. But some of the blame falls on Obama for trying to be overly non-partisan / bipartisan in his approach to governance thus far. Hopefully this incident will help him understand what type of people he's dealing with, and he will learn from his mistakes and act accordingly in his dealings with the conservative wing (or is it both wings and the breast?) of the GOP in the future.

The census didn't get removed to report to the WH (as I believe it was described) until certain people specifically complained to BHO about Commerce headed by Gregg being in charge. It was for specifically political purposes if you followed the announcement.

Don't you think that the WH has more on its plate than monitoring the scientific collection of data? Apparently some people want to use "innovative" methods to do it. You know, maybe like those the guy who did the Lancet study on Iraqi deaths used. It will be interesting to see who influences the data analyses.

At the news conference Thursday, House Republican leaders announced the formation of a census task force to keep an eye on developments. Republicans displayed a large placard with a 2006 quote from White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel that read, “If you think redistricting is always partisan and political which it is…it’s going to be on steroids this time.”

It appears that once Judd Gregg got an insider look at the new purple Gang from Chicago in action, he was not blinded anymore by the image of a sweet President with a Kenyan father. Here's hoping this wakes up some news media types too.

As usual, almost everyone on this thread, other than me, is wrong. Gregg's refusal to vote against the stimulus bill angered NH Republicans, who flooded his office with calls branding him as a traitor who ought to resign if he could not execute the dictates of the GOP. The GOP is living in fiscal and political fairytale-land, believing that it is earning points by looking like a gang of hateful, spiteful naysayers who spout gibberish that contradicts commonsense, logic, and its own ideology, when, in fact, now 58% of Americans hate the Republican opposition to the stimulus package and support for it has risen in part because of popular disgust with the GOP nonsense.

The timing of Gregg's withdrawal was supposed to endear him to Republican bigwigs by undercutting Obama's speech on the stimulus package and casting its passage into potential doubt; their actual strategy is "let's be as unpatriotic as possible and trash a popular, just elected President who is proposing policies that most Americans explicitly endorsed in Novemeber, elections are irrelevant". Gregg, by the way, would have had the same control over the census as other Commerce Secretaries have had; White House coordination with the Commerce Secretary is the norm. But Republican talking heads are so busy spinning everything into a paranoiac, psychotic version of events that facts are meaningless to them.

I used to respect the Republican Party, but the Party is earning no points with me now. For Republican governors to argue that they don't need the aid to states to keep unemployment down and public transportation running and police and firefighters on the job is not just ridiculous; it is dangerous. Sending cops and firefighters home without pay because Eric Cantor is afraid of losing a few seats in 2010 is about as immoral a move you can make. It is un-American. Some of these assholes should be deported.

Democrats frankly cannot be trusted with the Census. I for one hoped that Obama was different, but from the way he's been rolled by Pelosi and the Democrat leadership - and it's only 23 days! - it doesn't look hopeful.

I guess you you can take the boy out of Chicago but you just can't take the Chicago out of the boy.

Gregg's refusal to vote against the stimulus bill angered NH Republicans, who flooded his office with calls branding him as a traitor who ought to resign if he could not execute the dictates of the GOP.

How does that make any sense? What need did he have for NH Republicans once he was in the administration?

"It became clear to me that following this course would prove beyond a doubt that I am in fact dumber than a sack of hammers. Therefore, to preserve what little self-respect I currently possess, I am telling Obama through the national press, yo, no reach around for you!"

Was there a point at which this was somehow not partisan? It was clear from the beginning that Gregg wasn't going to have any real power or authority. That's why we were so mystified as to why he took the job -- it gave Obama political cover and earned Republicans nothing.

The voters did not elect Obama to make the census process a partisan political operation.

Obama is not doing that. WH coordination with Sec Com is routine. Your version of the facts is just wrong.

How does that make any sense? What need did he have for NH Republicans once he was in the administration?

If that were true, he wouldn't have withdrawn his nomination, either. Great with the logic, there. The story is that his career is finished in NH precisely because of his neutrality on the stimulus bill. Oh, and there are plenty of places to go after Sec Com in the private sector, but not if your own party HATES you.

If that were true, he wouldn't have withdrawn his nomination, either. Great with the logic, there. The story is that his career is finished in NH precisely because of his neutrality on the stimulus bill.

What?If he wouldn't have withdrawn his nomination, he wouldn't have needed the NH Republicans. He would have been in the Obama administration with no need for them. They could have said mean things about him, but he would still have a job in the administration.

He withdrew his nomination because he didn't want to be in the administration.

Charles Krauthammer said that there's only two things cool about working at the Commerce Dept: the census and they have a big aquarium in their lobby. After Obama took the census away, Gregg realized the only thing left for him to do was feed the fish.

During his campaign, Obama never brought up this plan to interfere with the census and remove it from the Commerce Dept.

Obama is not "interfering with the census" nor would it be "removed" from the Commerce Dept. WH coordination is routine, and that's all that is going to happen. It has happened under other Presidents as well. Only far right-wing loonies are converting this routine coordination into a sneaky attempt to turn this country into the United States of Mexico. I provided a link that explains that.

Oh, and there are plenty of places to go after Sec Com in the private sector, but not if your own party HATES you

There are plenty of places for a former Secretary of Commerce to go even if his own party hates him, assuming he has spent his time in office actually helping the private sector.

Of course, since the Obama administration will be spending the next four years fucking the private sector in the ASS, it could very well be that Gregg figured he wouldn't have a prayer of gainful employment at the end of his term. :)

Do you think Gregg was going to run for re-election in 2010 while he was in Obama's cabinet?

No. I think he hadn't been confirmed yet and Republican senators threatened to prevent his confirmation if he didn't get out because of his abstension on the stimulus bill; I also think they threatened to primary him in 2010 if he re-ran, just like GOP moderates who vote for the stimulus package will be primaried and are currently having GOP ads run against them.

For Republican governors to argue that they don't need the aid to states ... yadda yadda yadda.

Reminds me of the famous headline "Ford to New York City: Drop Dead"

Funny, but New York City didn't drop dead (they got a loan).

If you look up that headline, you'll see a whole lot of people have reused it. The general message is that telling something to drop dead doesn't mean what it used to me, back in the old country.

Another famous headline is The New York Times slam on Miami: "Can Miami Save Itself?" The headline is famous because it prompted Dave Berry's deadly counterattack. Can New York save itself? Here's one answer:

As Chuck and I walk along 42nd Street, we see a person wearing an enormous frankfurter costume, handing out coupons good for discounts at Nathan's Famous hot dog stands. His name is Victor Leise, age 19, of Queens, and he has held the position of giant frankfurter for four months. He says he didn't have any connections or anything; he just put in an application and, boom, the job was his. Sheer luck. He says it's OK work, although people call him "Frank" and sometimes sneak up and whack him on the back. Also there is not a lot of room for advancement. They have no hamburger costume.

"Can New York save itself ?" I ask him.

"If there are more cops on the streets, there could be a possibility," he says, through his breathing hole.

He had to withdraw in order to maintain his dignity. How would you react if you were offered a postion at, e.g., Harvard Law School, and you were told that you would not be allowed to teach certain aspects of your courses that have traditionally been taught by your predecessors?

You just write a book about someone the book-buying public hates. See: Paul O'Neill and Scott McClellan.

That only proves my point. Those guys are pariahs who will never be accepted back in the party's good graces. They regularly get trashed by conservatives. They don't even have many of the same friends anymore.

That only proves my point. Those guys are pariahs who will never be accepted back in the party's good graces. They regularly get trashed by conservatives. They don't even have many of the same friends anymore.

Yeah...because they wrote back-stabbing books books. That wasn't their only option. Well, maybe it was McClellan's only option, but O'Neill had other things to do.

It seems painfully obvious to me that Gregg didn't want to be part of a dysfunctional, one term administration. The power grab of the census taking along with the porkulus bill sealed the deal. Countdown to having an old washington hand like Lloyd Cutler advise the boy president.

Don't be silly. Do I read like a complete idiot? The NH GOP would primary him in 2010; Senate Republicans would trash his confirmation and schedule it poorly. He'd be done forever. They made this the best option.

Well, maybe it was McClellan's only option, but O'Neill had other things to do.

Paul O'Neill didn't backstab. He was hung out to dry and he spoke to a writer, Ron Susskind, who took that info and bashed the Bush administration. McClellan may have been an opportunistic hack, but O'Neill was actually a loyal Republican who was trashed unfairly.

This is making me rethink my earlier thoughts about Hillary and that position of ambassador to Iraq. I suspect that Obama is a micromanager. Well, there is that school of thought that he will be Carter's second term.

His replacement was weak and the Democrat candidates would be strong. The NH Repubs know they won't win that seat with a hardcore conservative in 2010; the point of primarying Gregg would just be to prevent him from retaking the seat.

Wow, what's with the comment by Mortimer Brezny that the GOP is "un-American"? Gadzooks, that kind of paranoid over the top rhetoric used to be denounced viciously by the Left when deployed against Leftists back in the 1950's. During the last administration, any whiff of such sentiment against the Left was vociferously denounced. Now with the Democrats in charge, dissent by the political minority -- a minority that can do nothing, by the way, in the House to prevent the majority from doing whatever it wants -- is free to be labeled "un-American."

During the W. administration, Democrats always said that "dissent was the highest form of patriotism." Doesn't that still hold?

Oh, wait. I forgot. It's only liberal dissent that's patriotic. Dissent by Republicans or conservatives is treason. Silly of me to have forgotten that!

Just like voter tricks that Democrats are so often willing to play (see the at least 100 votes double counted admission by the board in the Coleman-Franken debacle for just one of hundreds of Democrat tricks), the Census is the play toy and goodie bag of the Dems for doling out favors and privilege.

Remember the Clinton-years Census and the Democrat lying that went on - with straight faces - about how "estimates" were going to be more accurate than an actual, physical count? Of course, those estimates always counted more people of the demographic that supported Democrats - how interesting. Such drivel and disngenousness from a party who insists on paper ballots and counting every physical vote.

Not every Democrat is a liar - they are just willing to be led by those Democrats who are.

Bottle him up in committee; make his hearings nasty; delay the floor vote; filibuster the floor vote.

The minority cannot bottle him up in committee or delay a floor vote. And if there were enough Republicans to filibuster Gregg for not opposing the "stimulus", there would be enough Republicans to filibuster the stimulus itself. So that's obviously out, too.

So that leaves "nasty confirmation hearings". So Gregg gave up a cabinet post and a Senate career out of fear of... nasty confirmation hearings? Heh!

His replacement was weak and the Democrat candidates would be strong. The NH Repubs know they won't win that seat with a hardcore conservative in 2010; the point of primarying Gregg would just be to prevent him from retaking the seat.

It doesn't matter how weak the replacement was. She wasn't going to run.And Gregg wasn't going to run.A whole new Republican was promised in 2010 for NH.

Obama is not "interfering with the census" nor would it be "removed" from the Commerce Dept. WH coordination is routine, and that's all that is going to happen. It has happened under other Presidents as well. Only far right-wing loonies are converting this routine coordination into a sneaky attempt to turn this country into the United States of Mexico. I provided a link that explains that

I think that there is a difference between running the Census from the White House, or through the Department of Commerce. For one thing, the Secretary of Commerce is confirmed by the Senate, and Rohm Emmanuel is not.

A power grab for the Census should worry most everyone. The problem is the claim that the actual counting does not pick up all of the homeless, etc., and so is unfair to them. The proposed solution is to use statistical techniques to fudge the figures. Of course, those statistical techniques would be under the thumb of Emmanuel if the functionality were moved out of Commerce.

The Democrats have been pushing this for decades. I remember when Patsy Shroeder of Denver was pushing it 20 ago because she knew that the actual count would have Denver dropping below 500,000, in which case the city would lose control over federal funding to the state.

I believe that in the last election cycle, the courts said that counting meant counting, and not guessing or applying statistical techniques to fudge the figures in the case of apportionment for the House. But that still leaves allocating monies to the states, and possibly allocating legislative seats at the state level.

BTW, I still have fond memories of working as a programmer on the 1980 Census. The Census Bureau was where I first saw the good and the bad about government employees. There were a lot of very highly skilled and motivated young employees at the bottom who made things work. And then, there were a smaller number of journeymen programmers clogging the higher levels who had taken on-the-job retirement. They were pushed to the side during the run-up to the Decennial Census, but afterwards, when their jobs were eliminated, they were able to bump the young motivated programmers.

The minority cannot bottle him up in committee or delay a floor vote. And if there were enough Republicans to filibuster Gregg for not opposing the "stimulus", there would be enough Republicans to filibuster the stimulus itself. So that's obviously out, too.

None of the above is true. Your speculation about vote counting is just that: speculation. Republicans forced a 60 vote count rather than a simple majority vote on the stimulus because Kennedy is out with brain cancer. So they do have the votes for a filibuster.

Remember the Clinton-years Census and the Democrat lying that went on - with straight faces - about how "estimates" were going to be more accurate than an actual, physical count?

Except a Supreme Court case settled the matter so your fare-mongering scenario is impossible. They will be using a hard count, not sampling. That is why an extra billion was in the House Democrat version of the stimulus: so actual people could be employed to go door to door.

Democrats have the Commerce committee 14:11. Olympia Snowe is one of the Republicans. Mel Martinez is too, and he was one of the original negotiators. They were certainly not going to participate in your imagined plot.

That is like saying Republican governors would not denounce spending aid to the states to prevent unemployment or firing of police and firefighters. But the Republican Governor's association did just that. It's also like saying Susan Collins, on the Homeland Security and Government Oversight Committee, would not gut a provision ensuring more protections for federal whistleblowers to expose fraud and waste in goverment procurement given that she cared about cutting pork from the stimulus bill, but she stripped whistleblower protections from the stimulus bill. So your "logic" has no correspondence to the reality of what the GOP is actually doing.

The proposed solution is to use statistical techniques to fudge the figures. Of course, those statistical techniques would be under the thumb of Emmanuel if the functionality were moved out of Commerce.

This is a canard. Sampling will not be used, because the Supreme Court already held it unconstitutional.

I've been following Professor Althouse's blog off and on for years (via Insty), and with renewed interest post-election. Never participated before -- would like to play now, too -- looks like ever so much fun.

But, first, perhaps some of the regulars could clear something up for me. This M. Brezny fellow, is he a regular/semi-regular here? I don't recall any past posts from him, and now he shows up all inside baseball on the Gregg auto-dis-nomination (just made that one up, kinda like the rhythm of it). Seems especially curious that he would just show up out of the blue, which piqued my curiosity. Some sock-puppety incarnation of a former participant, perhaps? Intriguing, if so.

I find his sudden arrival coupled with his prolix posting at least as interesting as the latest Obama kerfuffle at hand. He presents a good deal of "authoritative" info regarding all things Gregg. Curious -- and, with each subsequent post, curiouser and curiouser. Really fascinating, regardless -- but, that may just be me.

Anyone else share similar thoughts? Hope I haven't crossed any blog etiquette line in expressing mine.

Mort:"Sampling will not be used, because the Supreme Court already held it unconstitutional."

It did? I thought that they held that it violated the Census Act and declined to reach the constitutional question (Dept. of Commerce v. U.S. House) and then punched out a nice big loophole for the sort of general "statistical techniques" Bruce actually referred to in Utah v. Evans.

Conservatives groups have been running ads against Arlen Specter ever since he torpedoed the Bork nomination 1987. This would presumably have been back during those famous days when you "used to respect the Republican Party".

Assuming, of course, that "used to" refers to some time within the last quarter-century. We already know it doesn't refer to the last four years. :)

"But, first, perhaps some of the regulars could clear something up for me. This M. Brezny fellow, is he a regular/semi-regular here? I don't recall any past posts from him, and now he shows up all inside baseball on the Gregg auto-dis-nomination (just made that one up, kinda like the rhythm of it). Seems especially curious that he would just show up out of the blue, which piqued my curiosity. Some sock-puppety incarnation of a former participant, perhaps? Intriguing, if so."

Mort has "been around" a while, mostly sleeping.

Amazingly, I have actually met "Mortimer Brezny" (not his real name) in person at an Althouse event in Brooklyn. I sat next to him! Real nice guy. You'd never suspect it from his commenter persona. Of course, you'd never expect me to be nice in person based on my commenter persona. And you know what? You'd be right!

Whoever is next at Commerce will actually be Obama's 4th! pick. Remember that Penny Pritzker was in the running until she also pulled out.-

CNN also reports that Pritzker is the leading candidate to head the Commerce department: Also, multiple Democratic sources say billionaire Chicago businesswoman Penny Pritzker is Obama's choice for commerce secretary. The sources say she will accept the job, which would be formally offered after vetting is complete. Pritzker ran Barack Obama's record-breaking fundraising effort, serving as the campaign's finance chair.

But the Washington Post's Democratic sources say her business dealings pose too many obstacles: "The issue is whether she ultimately wants to do this, and it may be - and probably will be - possible that for business reasons, she probably can't do it," said a Democratic source familiar with Obama's Cabinet selection process. The early favorite for the job, Pritzker may take herself out of the running soon, sources said. Pritzker was the first campaign insider and "Friend of Barack" to surface as a possible Cabinet pick.

The Chicago Tribune reports that Penny Pritzker, as Democratic insiders predicted, has taken herself out of the running: Chicago billionaire Penny Pritzker has told Barack Obama's team she does not want to serve as Commerce Secretary, said a senior Obama official. "Penny Pritzker ultimately has decided she does not want to do the Commerce thing," the senior official said.

Odd, isn't it, how the image you have in your head after reading someone's thoughts on a blog so rarely seem to jive with the real person. I think in your case, Msr. Palladian, I'd gladly buy you another round of whatever you were drinking. You're one of the many here whose posts I scout ahead in the thread for. Just sayin'...

Has anyone here read James Clavell's SHOGUN? There is a subplot wherein Lord Toranaga resigns from the Council of Regents, to throw the Council into disarray, and escapes from Osaka Castle. He is replaced with alarming swiftness but hark! Lord Sugiyama, a secret ally, resigns also.

Sugiyama however is captured and with his family meets a filthy torture death (and I don't mean waterboarding, stress positions or loud samisen music), however he will not betray Toranaga-sama by withdrawing his resignation and allowing him to be impeached and invited to commit seppuku. His entire family (and he himself) are tortured and murdered by agents of Lord Ishido, Protector of the Heir, Lord of the Armies of the West.

Well, in the end, er...Ishido gets it in the neck. But it's a fantastic read. And it makes one wonder what wheels within wheels go on here. I only wish it were anything as Macchiavellian (Tzuian?) as all that, but it's nice to think so. No doubt Gregg saw how stuffed he was and decided to Land It In The Hudson.

BTW I have much to gain from the stimulus bill; I want those green dollars posthaste. But probably it would be better for the country for it not to pass in its current form. I doubted that this could be achieved and was trying to allow myself to enjoy the inevitable; and yet, here we are!

Talk about a win-win!

...oops, on WABC radio in NYC there is news of a plane crash.

48 ppl from Newark, crashed outside Buffalo...Clarence, 01015 eastern, into a house engulfed in flames ...44 pax 4 crew no survivors i think they said

i think it was gregg who decided to become partisan. with all respect to the guy, i do understand why he withdrew from his nomination--he won't do anything that he thinks would not support his beliefs.

The question really is, did Obama decide to move the Census to Raul Emanuel's office BECAUSE he appointed a Republican to Commerce?

Moving the Census is, no matter how you look at it, a naked power grab. The 1980 census was seriously gerrymandered by the Democrats (then, as now, in charge of both Congress and the White House) and was responsible for most of the House GOP losses in that decade. I'm sure the Democrats are planning a similar assault on redistricting this time around. They couldn't chance Gregg's interference in their plan so they made an obvious power grab. Gregg couldn't let that slide.

How long do we have to hear partisan leftists tell us that they used to respect Republicans?

I voted for Bush and am a member of the Federalist Society, so, yes, I get to say with credibility that I used to respect the Republican Party. I still respect any number of individual Republicans. I am not a partisan leftist; I'm not even a leftist.

You in particular, Mort, should just stick to calling people racists.

Okay. Katon Dawson is a racist.

Amazingly, I have actually met "Mortimer Brezny" (not his real name) in person at an Althouse event in Brooklyn. I sat next to him! Real nice guy.

Hey, thanks!

The Senate voted for cloture. Ergo you are wrong.

Only by bribing the 3 "centrists" who are now being pressured by conservative groups running ads against them. One of those three could be flipped easily for a filibuster.

It did? I thought that they held that it violated the Census Act and declined to reach the constitutional question (Dept. of Commerce v. U.S. House) and then punched out a nice big loophole for the sort of general "statistical techniques" Bruce actually referred to in Utah v. Evans.

The problem with the current sampling techniques in question is that they can account for missing people, but not place them anywhere specifically. Indeed, extrapolation yields ridiculous results like claiming Indians on reservations have been overcounted. This is silly precisely because every American Indian receiving a stipend must remain on the land and everyone on the list of reservation residents is an American Indian receiving a stipend and anyone on the reservation not receiving a stipend is not an American Indian.

Based on the vote count in Dept. of Commerce, I think if a state sued for an apportionment error, all of the conservatives currently sitting would find such techniques unconstitutional. You can argue about what the case "held", but I think we all know that sometimes the Court uses the constitutional avoidance doctrine precisely when it is implying the constitutional question would come out one way and no other, but doesn't want to make the ruling simple because unforeseen circumstances may arise in the future and the institutional capital would be wasted.

I know if I was tapped for a job, and before even getting there they took away one of the major areas of responsibility, it would make me wonder why.

And more specifically, if I were in Gregg's shoes, I would be wondering which it was-- did they take it away because they feared I would be partisan with it or incompetent with it, either of which would be a tremendous insult and a deal breaker, or did they take it away because they intend to be partisan with it, which would be a deal breaker too for moral purposes.

It is not surprising to me, at all, that Gregg would then decide that there were other things he could not abide.

As for your sneer, stating an opinion as to what was probably the trigger is frothing? I could hardly care less who the Commerce Secretary is or if Gregg is in the Senate or not.

Is Texas-style the one where one party, let's call them the Fremocrats in our hypothetical, control redistricting for decades resulting in more seats than would otherwise occur if they were apportioned without gerrmandering? And then, once they manage sufficient majorities to do so, the other party, let's call them the Yepublicans, replace said gerrymandering with some of their own? And the Fremocrats freak out about this so badly that they literally run to another state to try and prevent it?

That might be entertaining, at least. But the drawing of districts has always been political, if not to the extent it is now.

What should never be political is the counting of people. One person, one tic. A person exists and can be identified and counted, or not.

Mort, I agree with what you're saying about what the court did in the census case, and what it will likely do in a successor case. Nevertheless, that concession belies the claim that "[s]ampling will not be used, because the Supreme Court already held it unconstitutional," doesn't it? Does the government never do things that the Supreme Court has hinted may fail constitutional muster in a future case?

the President of the United States asked him to serve his country. He declined because it would be too difficult.

Working for the passage of something you believe is damaging to your country is not serving your country. It's clear to me that he realized this. What puzzles me is not his withdrawl, but his initial acceptance.

Nevertheless, that concession belies the claim that "[s]ampling will not be used, because the Supreme Court already held it unconstitutional," doesn't it? Does the government never do things that the Supreme Court has hinted may fail constitutional muster in a future case?

Eric Holder can perform the same analysis I just did, as can Barack Obama and Greg Craig. So, I think they'd avoid doing it.

Mort, it was an open secrete that Gregg wasn't going to run in 2010. Relying on a Newspaper pretending it has a scoop or is surprised is not a very reliable way to analyze political events.

* * *

And to clarify to other posters here; the Secretary of Commerce being in charge of the census is not tradition; it's the law. The way the constitution is written in this regard, the census doesn't even have to be performed by the Executive branch--Congress could create an entirely independent group that answers to it. As it is, they will no doubt change the law an let Obama put in the fix (hell, this is the same group of idiots that doesn't see a problem in giving DC a voting representative.)

I second the motion that Mortimer Brezny is a nice guy. I also met him at the first meet up in Brooklyn. Although I really didn't get to talk to him too much because I was busy swilling beer and trying to start mayhem, he was quiet and self effacing and polite. Much more Urkel than Al Sharpton. And I mean that in good way.

On the other hand Palladian is really full of shit. He is an extremely nice guy that you would have a lot of fun hanging around with. Don't let his crusty persona fool you; you would be proud to call him a friend.

It was apparent if you had bothered to listen to Barack's premier press performance that Obama was just using Gregg and other Republican appointees for leverage in the vote for the stimulus package.

Obama whined twice during that like a big titty baby-

Waaaa! I've appointed more cabinet positions from the other party in the History of the world! and look how they wouldn't vote for my own personal frontloaded slush fund to be redistributed til 2010 and beyond!

You know, nevermind the fact that the only damn reason he was historical was because he was an idiot and tried to ram Richardson the corrupt Democrat through.

You should have seen it-Obama did a good impression of Blagojevich expecting his dues.

So -Judd Gregg said screw it especially in light of the fact that after this historic slush fund bill, with the concurrent raping on the horizon of the Defense budget while guys are still out in the fields and the Census game-it's over.

"(That said, [Commerce] and department of education should be eliminated.)"

Why? I'm often the first (and sometimes the only) one to complain about fraudulent use the Commerce Clause is put to, whenever it's even faintly related to the topic at hand. But even I don't pretend that it's not there in the Constitution, or that actual Interstate Commerce doesn't exist.

Perhaps you just mean that it doesn't warrant a cabinet-level secretary? I'd certainly be open to discussing that.